We are looking for highly motivated Ph.D. candidates












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            Do you want to study intercellular communication between tumour cells and help find new me
            personalised treatment of pancreatic tumours?


            Join our team at the Laboratory of Metabolism and Bioenergetics at the Third Faculty of Me
            University!


            We offer a PhD position on a research project with significant translational potential. We
            biology and treatment of pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) – one of the most aggress

            unfortunately still resists standard cancer therapy.

            The low five-year survival rate for PDAC is directly linked to the rapid development of re

            chemotherapeutic agents. One aspect of this problem is the extreme metabolic plasticity of
            which can reprogram their metabolism, for example, by increasing glycolysis (the Warburg e
            changing the transport of lactate and amino acids. Furthermore, they can cooperate with or

            surrounding non-tumour cells as sources for their own growth and spread.

            The project we invite you to work on deals with one of the most recently described mechani

            resistance: intercellular communication via tunnelling nanotubes (TNTs). These thin, membr
            intercellular tubes function as "highways" for the active transport of cellular material. 
            laboratory, we are investigating how PDAC cells, often in response to chemotherapy-induced

            TNT production to transfer mitochondria, various proteins and metabolites, and, last but n
            ribosomal components, whose transport was first described by our laboratory. This transfer
            cells to enhance their metabolism and protein synthesis, which contributes significantly t

            resistance of the tumour.

            Your work will be closely linked to clinical medicine and the opportunity to help real pat

            part of the project is the development of methods for personalised treatment based on earl
            tumour sensitivity to chemotherapeutic agents and prediction of treatment response based o
            and properties of tumour cells grown in short-term culture. You will work with expanded ce

            and organoids derived from patient biopsies. You will learn to measure metabolic and signa
            in real time using advanced technologies (e.g., Seahorse XF) and analyse data in accordanc
            principles of open science, with a preference for Bayesian statistical models and the poss

            machine learning.

            Previous experience with cell cultures, molecular biological and biochemical methods is a 

            If you also enjoy mathematics, statistics, and programming, we can achieve even more toget
            information about our laboratory and work can be found here [ URL "3LFEN-386.html "] .


            Please send your applications by 30 April 2026.

            For more information or to express your interest in studying, please contact the head of t

            directly at jan.trnka(zavinac)lf3.cuni.cz [ MAIL "jan.trnka(zavinac)lf3.cuni.cz"] .